At a distance of around 25,000 light years, M13 is a globular cluster
comprising of more than 100,000 stars. The "Great Globular Cluster in
Hercules", as it is often referred to, was discovered by Edmond Halley in
1714. Funnily, when Messier catalogued it in 1764 he described it as a
"nebula containing no stars".

The stars within M13 are quite old, around
14 billion years. However, there is a peculiar young blue star contained
within the cluster, seen here just above-right of its centre - which is
strange for such an old star formation and apparently is a field star
captured by M13's gravity.

Click on the image to open a high resolution version.

This snapshot of M13 is my "first light" image with the Canon EOS 350D
DSLR camera.